Posted 12:29 PM by Floyd

Via Jeff Jarvis I found out that Germany has a unique excuse for not forgiving Iraqi debts:

Paul Wolfowitz, the deputy defense secretary of the United States, has asked Germany, France and Russia to forgive debt to Iraq totaling around EUR20 billion ($21.8 billion), of which it owes Germany EUR4 billion. But the German chancellery remained tight-lipped, saying only that the United Nations was in charge of forgiving debt.

So if you're a government and you forgive a debt to another nation, the UN will step in and debate the issue, then pass a resolution telling you to stop? And if you fail to collect, they pass sanctions on you?

Supposedly there have been a lot of stupid people in Washington. George Bush can't talk, and John Ashcroft covers classical statues of naked women when he gives press conferences, and Tom Ridge is trying out for a Cosmo gig as a color and hues columnist. Two administrations back we had a vice president who wasn't very good at spelling vegetables. Has any of these people ever said, as an official response to an important foreign policy question, anything as can't-tell-your-ass-from-a-hole-in-the-ground dumb as "we can't forgive the debt because the United Nations is in charge of that"?!